


A Force Far Too Great For Your Size

by doctormchotson



Series: A Force Far Too Great For Your Size [1]
Category: Sherlock (TV), Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, BAMF John, BAMF Johnny, BAMF Sherlock, Blood, F/M, Fem!John - Freeform, Female John Watson, First Kiss, Genderbend, Genderbending, Genderswap, Guns, Gunshot Wounds, Hurt/Comfort, John Whump, Johnny Whump, Pre-Reichenbach, Sherlock Holmes/Female John Watson, Violence, girl!john, in which I make things complicated for myself by naming her "Johnny", kind of?, more hurt than comfort really, possible triggers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-05-14
Updated: 2014-05-14
Packaged: 2018-01-24 16:32:08
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,291
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1611866
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/doctormchotson/pseuds/doctormchotson
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Johnny makes a decision that has some rather painful consequences. Sherlock, predictably, has a hissy fit.</p><p>In which fem!John is a BAMF, Sherlock is a BAMF, Sherlock has <i>feelings</i>, and they both come to an understanding.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Force Far Too Great For Your Size

**Author's Note:**

> I am not a medical professional, nor am I well versed in proper combat procedure. I did my best research but the internet can really only do so much. I apologize for all mistakes. I doubly apologize for any Americanisms, bro.
> 
> Title from [this poem](http://mccoyquialisms.tumblr.com/post/59553104651/love-letter-from-a-scientist).

Johnny Watson, backlit by the flashing lights of police vehicles, stood chatting with one of the lower level officers on scene, hip cocked and head tilted coyly. She grinned shyly and glanced up at the man through her lashes, internally rolling her eyes at the way his attention strayed to her ample-enough chest. She could feel the burn of Sherlock's judgmental gaze attempting to light her on fire. Or possibly Officer Nitwit. Actually, probably both. When the officer (finally) asked for her number she bit her lip, gave a demure, "Yeah, sure, here" and made sure to brush his hand with her fingertips when he passed her his phone. 

Contact information entered, she nodded, smiled, turned, and walked to the simmering cloud of Sherlock's (poorly) restrained pique, allowing her hips to sway just a touch out of their usual militaristic rigidity. Which, of course, Sherlock noticed, glared about, and twirled off with a huff and a flare of coat. Johnny chuckled, and the instant her phone dinged with an incoming message she stretched out her stride into an easy, athletic cadence that made the back of her neck prickle with the memory of Afghan sun. She caught up with Sherlock just as he reached the police tape, which he then lifted for her, although with a scowl and extremely ill grace. 

"I will never understand why that bothers you so much," Johnny said, eyes scanning the road they'd just walked onto. 

Sherlock groaned in a perfect imitation of an exasperated two year old. "Because it's inelegant, unnecessary, and completely beneath you! You complain about men viewing women only as sex objects, and then you comport yourself as a sex object!" 

"No," Johnny replied, the picture of calm, "I comported myself as a woman with breasts and a rather shapely ass, if I do say so myself. If he wants to interpret that as me being a sex object it's no skin off my nose." 

She could feel Sherlock giving her the "humans are completely baffling" face and she grinned. "If it's so contradictory then maybe I should just delete that phone record you wanted off my the email he just sent. And I suppose you'll be upset to know that similar methods garnered information relevant to, oh, I dunno, five of the last nine cases? And, really, who are you to talk, Mr. Cry-On-Cue. How is that any less, how did you put it, 'inelegant, unnecessary, and completely beneath you' than a little flirting?" 

Out of the corner of her eye she watched him fume while his delicate system overloaded on the illogical nature of interpersonal relationships and the very real possibility he was feeling something as pedestrian as _jealousy_. 

"Oh for God's sake!" Sherlock shouted, "Just shut up and give me the damn phone records!" He gave her a little extra glare and quite visibly resisted the temptation to stamp his feet. 

Johnny laughed outright and reached into her jacket pocket for her phone when shots erupted around them. 

Instinct, hard worn into her by Her Majesty's Army, had Sherlock shoved forcibly behind a nearby skip, and her crouched next to him defensively, gun in hand, within two seconds of the first shot. 

"There!" Sherlock shouted over the chaos of dozens of police officers ducking for cover and barking out orders, gunfire still echoing off the buildings. 

He stretched a long arm past her ear and pointed to the rooftop of a nearby building, where the flash of a muzzle could be barely seen over the ledge. Given the positioning, it would be nigh on impossible to hit the shooter, and nigh on impossible for the shooter to miss the scattered police who were all sitting ducks in the exposed roadway. Johnny immediately lined up and fired off two rounds to the ledge directly in front of the gun, hoping for a ricochet or to frighten the shooter if they were inexperienced. The shots were true, as they always were with her, but the shooter was definitely not inexperienced, and instead of being frightened into worse positioning took the opportunity to turn their aim for her. Sherlock, anticipating the turn of events, grabbed her by both shoulders and tugged, giving her a momentum boost to push with her legs and fling them both fully behind the skip. 

"Bloody buggering fuck," Johnny muttered, counting the rounds that pinged off the skip and the alley wall above it. She was relatively certain there was only one shooter, but "relatively certain" tended to get people killed in these types of situations in her experience. 

"Quite," Sherlock replied, before popping his head above the skip just when there was a lull in the firing. Johnny knew just as well as he did that the shooter would have to reload just then, but that didn't stop her from wanting to call Sherlock every dirty name the army ever taught her for scaring her half to death anyway. He'd brought himself back under cover and had just opened his mouth to speak when the shooting began again. There was the unmistakable wet thump of a bullet hitting flesh and an obviously female shout of shock and agony. 

Johnny swore and popped her head around the side of the skip furthest from the shooter to assess the scene. Sally Donovan lay sprawled halfway to her cruiser, out in the open and clutching her obviously bleeding leg. The shots had moved on to the wall Lestrade and the others had all retreated to, likely to prevent them from coming to Donovan's aide. Within seconds Johnny had taken in the angles, calculated the odds, and come to a decision. If that decision would've made her CO proud, and would probably get Sherlock to throw cutlery at her later, well, she didn't have the time to think about that. 

She spun, thrust the gun into Sherlock's hands, screamed, "Cover me!" and took off around the skip at a crouching run. Ignoring the obscenities being yelled at her in a posh baritone, she moved at an oblique angle to her target, adding a waver to her path to decrease predictability. When a shot ricocheted off the ground by her left foot, she dove right, rolled behind a cruiser, stuck her foot past the far side the cruiser, waited for another missed shot (they may be experienced but the shooter was certainly no marksman), and then flat out sprinted the remaining distance to Donovan's side. 

Keeping as much of herself out of the line of fire, and whatever else between Donovan and the shooter, she immediately set to work on stabilizing Donovan. The wound was a through-and-through in the outer part of Donovan's thigh, no visible skeletal damage, but lots of blood loss. Johnny tugged off the scarf Sherlock had made her wear and wrapped it tightly around Donovan's leg as a makeshift tourniquet, and then applied pressure directly to the wound, causing Donovan to keen in pain. 

"You're gonna be okay!" she yelled. Donovan was conscious and coherent, but obviously in extreme pain and beginning to show signs of shock, fine shivers running through her body. There wasn't much she could do with the shooter still firing pot shots at everyone who so much as moved, but the blood loss was going to become a severe problem, and quite quickly. "Sally, are you with me? You're gonna be fine!" 

Donovan blinked up at her a bit dazed and said, calmly and distinctly, "You are the craziest motherfucker I have ever met. Are you gay? Even a little? Cause I think I'd really like to kiss you." 

Johnny laughed, and efficiently slid the first two fingers of one hand on Donovan's neck to check her pulse, which was slightly elevated. "Sorry, babe, straight as they come. But if that changes I'll give you a call, yeah?" she said, and gave a bit of a wink, setting Donovan off giggling. 

Just then, Sherlock's desperate, screaming voice cut through the din she'd ignored in favor of her patient. 

"JOHNNY GET DOWN!" 

She moved before she consciously registered the words, flinging herself down and instinctively covering Donovan's body with her own. It wasn't until after she'd hit the deck that the pain to her lower right side registered, and when it did it exploded into firey agony. 

Getting shot wasn't the kind of thing that got easier with experience. It hurt like a bitch, every single time. On some level she knew that it was likely not fatal; it's a superficial wound, just a graze, not even a through and through, although judging by the pain to her lowest rib there's a definite possibility of a cracked rib, splintered at worst, which would mean surgery and a long recovery time but probably not death since they weren't stranded in a desert. But clinical assessment aside, it was flat terrifying and took her several long moments of teeth-gritted motionless to marshal her resources and take her pain down to levels conducive to functionality. 

Through the haze of pain she was dimly aware of an animalistic bellow, two shots fired by what sounded like her gun, and then silence. Until, of course, Sherlock came crashing to his knees beside her, choked out her name in a shaking voice, and grasped her upper arm with the intent of rolling her to her back, thereby shattering any control she thought she'd acquired. 

"MotherFUCKER," she shouted, clenching her eyes shut and baring her teeth. 

"Are you alright? What do you need me to do?" Sherlock said, still too loud and shaking. "WHERE'S THE FUCKING AMBULANCE YOU INCOMPETENT SODS?" he yelled over his shoulder before turning back to her. 

He hovered one hand over her wound and cradled the side of her face with the other, his touch gentler than she thought possible. She tore her eyes open, teeth still clenched tight against the pain, and stared up into Sherlock's terrified face. "You're alright, you're alright, Johnny, Johnny, please tell me you're alright," he muttered like a prayer, pleading with his eyes, fingers tracing anxious lines along her jaw. The sight of it kicked in her chest and she felt like she'd been shot all over again. 

She reached up with her left hand and wrapped her fingers around his wrist and squeezed as tightly as he could, knowing she was leaving bruises, but that he needed the reassurance just then. "I'm alright," she whispered. "I'm alright." Johnny loosened her grip and stroked her fingertips up his hand to thread their fingers together against her face. "You mad stupid wanker, I'm alright." 

Something in Sherlock's very being seemed to snap at that and that ramrod straight back of his seemed to lose all structural integrity. He folded forward until his forehead pressed to hers. He was breathing like he'd run a marathon, and the sound of it echoing in the cocoon of their faces, and the feel of it across her skin, washed away even the pain of the gunshot wound for just a moment. She could smell him; fear and sweat and blood and stupidly expensive hair product and that spice of man she pretended didn't make her want to rub herself all over him. She curled herself closer to him without thinking about it, and her gunshot wound made a cacophonous reappearance into their little moment. 

"Fuckfuckfuckfuckfuckfuck," she hissed through her teeth, clenching her eyes closed again and squeezing unconsciously to Sherlock's fingers still trapped within her own. She knew he was yelling orders and insulting the intelligence of any and all creatures within range, but she couldn't hear a word of it over the ringing in her ears. 

EMTs came, after she'd interrupted her litany of cursing to make sure they took care of Donovan first, and they had her loaded into an ambulance and on their way in short order. There was some momentary question of Sherlock's presence in the ambulance but even shot they'd have had a hell of a time getting her to let go of his hand now, even if he hadn't glared them all into submission. Johnny passed the trip grinding her teeth and willing herself not to cry while Sherlock murmured the alphabetized scientific names of what she thought were bees in her ear. 

\----------------------

At some point during the insanity of the ER, Sherlock managed to disappear. Johnny wasn't surprised, though she would've liked some company during the tedious process of testing and scanning and poking and prodding and finally being told a long list of things she already knew. With no internal damage, nothing punctured, two ribs only cracked and not broken or splintered, everything cleaned and stitched and wrapped, Johnny flat refused to stay for observation. She flapped her hands at the hovering nurses and told the doctor (who she knew from Bart's and quite honestly thought was a complete dimwit) in no uncertain terms to fuck right off. After she'd checked herself out and was making her painful way out of the hospital, she spotted Lestrade wrestling with the coffee maker in the corner of the ER waiting room and made a detour. 

Lestrade's head snapped up at her approach and his exhausted, bloodshot and bruised eyes widened. 

"Bloody hell, Johnny, you look like shite!" 

Johnny thought of the battered reflection in the loo mirror and conceded the point. She tried a grin that came out more like a grimace. "That's known to happen when you get shot." 

Lestrade frowned and opened his mouth to ask questions Johnny was fairly certain she didn't want to answer so she cut him off with a brusque, "Donovan?" 

"Just came out of surgery, doctors say she'll be fine with PT, no lasting damage," he replies, matching her professional tone. Johnny nods, relieved but not surprised. Lestrade gives his coffee a considering look before continuing. 

"They also say she'd like as not be dead if it weren't for you," he glanced down at her, "Doesn't mean you're not a complete nutter for what you did but. Thank you." 

Johnny looked past Lestrade, absentmindedly scanning the hospital inhabitants for concealed weaponry. "Yes well." 

After an awkward moment, Lestrade cleared his throat and asked, "So where's Sherlock got off to?" 

Johnny shrugged and moved on from searching for concealed weaponry to attempting to diagnose passers by on sight alone. "Home, I expect." 

Lestrade frowned harder and fiddled with his coffee some more. "I'm a bit surprised to see him away from you, if I'm quite honest," he said, attempting nonchalance and failing. 

Johnny turned to look at him then, cocking her head in silent question. 

"Well, after that stunt he pulled, and his...reaction to you being shot, I figured he'd be biting the heads off of anyone who so much as looked at you," he said, waving his hands a bit. 

She merely lifted an eyebrow and asked, "Stunt?" 

Lestrade appeared surprised by her confusion. "Well, yes. I suppose you were a bit preoccupied at the time but, well. He went a bit. Beserk." He paused and scratched an eyebrow. Johnny lifted both eyebrows and gave him a 'go on' hand gesture. Lestrade sighed. 

"The shooter had changed position, exposed himself a bit to get a clear shot at you. When you went down, we all knew you'd been hit but not how badly. Sherlock, he. Well, he came running out gun up, firing away, yelling like he'd been shot and not you. Got the guy in the shoulder, he'll live, but I suspect Sherlock might be disappointed to hear that." He shifted his gaze from attempting to read her reaction to sweep the room. "Never seen him react like that before. Never thought I would, really. Not much for sentiment, that one." 

Lestrade looked her in the eye again, and Johnny was suddenly glad for all the money she lost at poker during her army years. She schooled her face and simply replied, "No, I don't suppose he is." 

At her non-reaction, Lestrade sighed. "Right, well, you'd best get home and rest. Tell Sherlock I'll need both your statements by tomorrow afternoon at the latest." 

Johnny nodded and started her painful shuffle for the door when Lestrade called her name and she turned back. 

He looked her steady in the eye and said, "I'm glad you're okay. And, well. Thank you again. For Donovan." Johnny gave him a soft smile and a sharp nod and watched Lestrade make his sure way to the counter to speak to the nurse. 

\----------------------

When she'd been shot, it had been early evening, dark but not yet full night. When she finally made her exit from the hospital the sun had fully risen and was well on its way to afternoon. She squinted against the light and signalled for a taxi. 

After one rather needlessly bumpy cab ride, and a lot of twitters and exceedingly gentle hugs from a flustered Mrs. Hudson, Johnny found herself at the bottom of a flight of stairs that hadn't been an issue for her since the first night she'd seen them. She straightened her back, set her chin, remembered that a flight of stairs was nothing compared to carrying a 50 lb pack through the sands of Afghanistan, and carted herself upwards, cursing each step of the way. 

Johnny opened the door to a completely silent flat and an extremely moody flatmate sitting in his armchair staring into an unlit fireplace, fingers steepled beneath his chin. She thought about making some kind of cheeky greeting but she was still breathing hard from the ordeal of the stair and didn't feel like exposing quite how much pain she was still in just yet. With a sigh she made her way into the kitchen and set down the various detritus she'd collected from the hospital. 

She puttered over to the kettle and began the soothing familiarity of making herself a cuppa. Once the kettle clicked, she reached up for a mug and couldn't contain the hiss of pain at the stretch. 

Sherlock was out of his chair in a heartbeat, four long strides eating up the distance from chair to kettle in an enviably short time. Before Johnny had caught her breath, he had reached up, contorting himself so as not to touch her at all, grabbed a mug, slammed it down onto the worktop, and fumed his way back into position in his chair, looking as though he hadn't moved an inch. 

Johnny stared for a moment at the cloud of fury emanating from her best friend, pinched the bridge of her nose with her left hand, and gritted her teeth. 

"Right," she said, ignoring the way her nerves jangled at the sound of her voice in the midst of all the silent anger. "Right, so, are we not talking about this then? You just gonna sit there and stew because, what? You had an emotional response?" 

Sherlock's face hardened but he gave no other indication of having heard her. 

"I got shot, Sherlock. It was a graze for Christ's sake, I wasn't even in hospital a full day. I'm fine." 

Sherlock flung himself from his chair and came barreling toward her, head down and furious, yet somehow still elegant. He backed her up against the worktop, crowding her but not touching her, one hand hovered over her throat, the other fisted and coming to an abrupt stop millimeters from her damaged side. Under normal circumstances, such an aggressive action would've earned him an arm twisted up behind his back, or his feet swept out from under him, or a ferocious knee to the balls. In the state she was in, there wasn't a damn thing she could do about it, and they both knew it. 

She'd expected that should Sherlock ever find himself in a position of such physical dominance over her he'd be triumphant, cocky, perhaps even a bit turned on. But Johnny saw nothing of the sort in the face so close to hers. All she could see was miles and miles of miserable rage. 

"Yes. You're quite fine. I can see that now, my mistake," he says, still unmoving from his aggressive posture, voice aiming for sarcasm but coming up entirely too laced with pain. 

Johnny sighed, willing her heart rate down. Her eyes softened in understanding and she lifted her hand to his face. When her palm cupped his cheek, he dropped his hands and closed his eyes tightly. Minute tremors started to run through his body. He tore himself away from her and paced to the other side of the kitchen where he stopped, back to her. His left arm hugged his middle while the other hand covered his face. 

"Alright," Johnny said softly, "I'm not fine." Sherlock snorted in mirthless agreement. 

"And I'm sorry about that," she said, voice still soft. "I'm sorry you had to see that," Sherlock's shoulders tightened visibly. "But," she continued, letting hardness creep into her voice, "I'm not sorry I did what I did." 

Sherlock turned, hand thrust violently in his hair, and opened his mouth to speak. She flung her hand up, tipping her chin forward pugnaciously, mouth held in a tight line. 

"No, Sherlock. I will not apologize for upholding the oath I took as a doctor, the oath I took as a _soldier_. I will not apologize for _doing my job_." Johnny fisted her hands at her sides, straightened her back as best she was able and lifted her head, shifting herself into an unconscious parade rest. 

Sherlock stared for a moment, hand still tightly gripped in his hair, looking at her completely incredulously. He flung his hands in the air. 

"Where does it say that risking your life for _Sally Donovan_ is in your job description?" 

"Right here," Johnny answers without hesitation, tapping the center of her chest. "The same place that says you have to go traipsing off to Dartmoor to solve a decades old murder because some guy uses the word 'hound'. It's who we are." 

Johnny watches the muscle of his jaw twitch. "I know you don't like it," she says, "You don't like seeing me hurt any more than I like watching you facing off with the Deadly Murderous Nemesis of the week." He twists his mouth in a grimace, likely at her phraseology. "But this is us, at our finest. It's not a safe life, being us. But neither of us have ever really done well with 'safe' now have we?" 

Sherlock stared at her, eyes seeming to traverse the whole of her, soul and all, before coming to a stop at her eyes and setting up camp. His face is unreadable, until suddenly it seems to soften and resolve itself at the same time. His eyes, though still a bit anguished, warm as they bore into hers. 

"No," he says, and a hint of a smile seems to cross his face. "No I don't suppose we have." And with that he moved toward her, slower this time, giving her a chance to move if she wanted to, looking as though he can't decide if she's the most brilliant person he's ever met or the most idiotic. He stopped well within her personal space, still staring at her in something akin to awe. And then, as if he found some sort of answer in her face, he leaned the rest of the scant few inches between them and kissed her. 

Johnny had never planned on kissing Sherlock Holmes. She'd maybe hoped for it before being summarily rejected at that first diner, and she definitely fantasized about it in the months since, but she'd never thought it would happen. No meant no as far as she was concerned, and if he said girlfriends weren't his area, well, she wasn't about to pressure him into changing his mind. So she didn't think you could really blame her for needing a moment to register that, yes, those really were Sherlock Holmes' lips pressing against hers and, yes, that really was Sherlock Holmes' tongue swiping across her mouth. 

When she didn't respond, Sherlock stiffened and made to retreat, and she could literally feel the stammered apologies and denials forming on his lips. Something in her snapped, and with a growl she'd probably be embarrassed about later, she grabbed him by the back of the neck and brought his lips back to hers. He outright whimpered, like she was water in a desert, or the last digit of pi. Like she was a thing more precious than he'd ever thought he could have. She grinned into the kiss, and threaded her fingers into his hair. She opened her mouth and stroked her tongue between his lips and did her damnedest not to whoop with joy when he opened for her, and gripped her to his chest tight enough to bruise. 

They stood there, kissing, him gentle with her injury and nothing else, and her staking claim to him with her teeth and lips and tongue, until they came up for air, gasping for breath. They laughed, unfettered, like they'd just chased a particularly brilliant criminal across all of London. Like they'd just solved the best case of their lives. 

Sherlock buried his face in her neck and pressed his open mouth to her racing pulse, not kissing so much as feeling the blood pounding it's furious way through her veins. 

"There are a lot of things in this world I can lose," he murmurs, soberly, his lips brushing her skin making her shudder. He pulls back and looks her in the eye. "You are not one of them." 

Johnny stares back at him, letting every ounce of her hardened steel inner core shine through her face. 

"You won't," she says, and bares her teeth in a grin.

**Author's Note:**

> Any and all comments, critiques, advice, kudos, squees of joy, or thrown tomatoes are greatly appreciated. Yes, even the tomatoes. I can always use them to make some spaghetti sauce. (Mmmm, pasta)
> 
> If anyone's interested in more fic featuring Johnny, please let me know as I can be very easily persuaded to do a bit more exploration in fem!John.


End file.
